Tales of the Brovahkiin
by Arcane-Boomeus
Summary: Rated T for some moderately bad words, (I haven't used Brovahkiin anywhere in the story, but I felt it was appropriate for the title for some reason.) The Dragonborn and his faithful companion, Lydia, have zany adventures. Some other people come along, too, but who cares about them? (DovahkiinxSerana) It may have minor references to other things, but Skyrim is the primary setting.


**TALES OF THE BROVAHKIIN:**

**EPISODE ONE:**

**'So Almost-Serious That it Hurts (in the sense that it's funny, not painful. Unless you're a grumpy old poopy-head who hates laughter and joy)'**

The Dovahkiin flipped back his dragon-hide mage's hood as he regarded Serana and Isran. Lydia, his faithful companion, housecarl, and friend, placed a hand on his shoulder. Her ebon gauntlet gleamed coldly in the dim lighting of Fort Dawnguard's torture room.

"I've got your back," Lydia said softly, and the Dovahkiin knew it was true. She recognized the slight vertical movement of his head as a nod of acceptance- so keen was her perception that she noticed it even through his thick black hair, which obscured his head and neck from behind.

"If the Moth Priests are all in Cyrodil, and we truly need to find one," the Dovahkiin addressed Serana, the vampiress who was ballsy enough to walk into the stronghold of a bunch of vampire hunters whilst toting an Elder Scroll stolen from her father (who was also known as Lord Harkon, the most powerful vampire in Skyrim), "I suppose we'll be on a trip to Cyrodil."

Isran cleared his throat. "I saw an Imperial scholar coming here from the south a few days back, whilst I was staking out the road."

The Dragonborn nodded appreciatively, exaggerating the gesture beyond his normal, minute nod- probably make certain that Isran was aware of his gratitude. "That'll save a lot of time."

"Do you know where he was headed?" Serana asked impatiently.

"No," Isran replied, "and I won't waste manpower finding out. You're on your own."

The Dovahkiin nodded his usual, almost impossible to notice nod. Isran's refusal was understandable, expected, and probably rather wise- Fort Dawnguard was horribly undermanned as things stood, and Isran couldn't afford to send them all out if he'd wanted to. "Thank you for the information, Isran. We'll manage."

Isran grimaced. Hesitantly, he said, "Don't waste any time. I need you here at Fort Dawnguard as soon as possible."

Serana turned to face the Dragonborn. "Well, you heard the man. Let's get going..."

The vampiress frowned. "But... how do I know I can trust your lover over there?"

The Dovahkiin frowned. He shot a confused look at Isran. "Serana, I don't know where you got that idea from, but Isran isn't my lover. I'm not gay."

Serana made a confused face that rivaled the Dovahkiin's confused face in confused-ness. "What? No, I was referring to _her,_" she said, pointing a pale finger at Lydia.

The Dragonborn frowned. "Lydia?" He laughed. "Lydia's my dearest friend. I have _platonic_ love for her. If I love-loved her, I wouldn't have agreed to her letting me ride bitch before I got Shadowmere! She's the epi-tome of bro."

"Okay," Serana said, her confused face adopting a bit of annoyance and curiosity in addition of the confusion, "I have two questions."

Isran sighed, pinched his temples, and left the room, mumbling something about being the one doing the torturing.

"Ask away," the Dovahkiin said.

"First off, what, exactly, is 'riding bitch'?"

"When one is riding bitch, one is mounted behind the person holding the reins of the horse," the Dragonborn explained politely.

"Alright, second question," Serana murmured, more to herself than to the other participant in the conversation, "Did you meant to say 'ih-pih-toe-mee'?"  
The Dragonborn arched an eyebrow, though this was visible to no-one, as his thick black hair also covered his eyebrows. "Epi-tome? E-P-I-T-O-M-E? As in, the prime example of something? I always thought it was the prefix 'epi'- which, if I remember correctly, means something along the lines of 'surface' (the epidermis, for example, is the outermost layer of skin)- combined with the word 'tome', which, as I'm sure you know, is a book... though the meaning seems to have become more specific, referring to books that are particularly large, significant (or otherwise noteworthy), ominous, old, musty, and/or leatherbound."

"Okay," Serana said, "the bit about 'epi' makes sense, but... what in Oblivion do books have to do with it?"

The Dovahkiin brought a hand up under his chin and thought. After several moments of silence, he said, "Think of 'bro' as a library. You walk in, and take the first book off of the first shelf you see- the outermost book. You open it up, and it's Lydia's life story."

Serana blinked twice, her glowing orange eyes flashing in a way that drew the Dragonborn's attention to them. "Well," she said after several moments of silence, "that's certainly very interesting."

The Dovahkiin flipped his hood back up over his head, hoping to hide the blush that had reddened his cheeks so abruptly. "So," he said, turning away from Serana abruptly, "are you ready to begin looking around for this Moth Priest?"

"...Yeah... Let's get going."

The Dragonborn and his companions made it to the doors of Fort Dawnguard before he realized some things. "Okay, I have two matters to bring to your attention," he said, stopping and whirling around to face the two women following him.

"She can ride with you," Lydia said, addressing one of the issues without being prompted, "She doesn't trust me, and my horse is burdened enough as it is, hauling me and my equipment around. Shadowmere's stronger, and you're both lighter."

"Alright," the Dragonborn said, silently loathing the fact that Lydia had almost certainly noticed that he'd taken a fancy to Serana, and had managed to make the two ride together with logic- before he'd even been able to ask the question she'd so expertly answered, "second order of business-"

Serana, following Lydia's example, addressed the other matter before it was brought up. "I was thinking we could ask around at the College of Winterhold," she said, "the mages there always seemed to know things that they shouldn't."

"Preach it, sister," Lydia sighed, recalling the ordeal involving the College's discovery of the Eye of Magnus.

The Dovahkiin had been thinking along the same lines, and, while he was relieved that Serana had been thinking similarly, he was still irked by the way she cut him off. "I was thinking much the same thing," he said, "Urag gro-Shub, the bookkeeper in the Arcanaeum, has been keeping an Elder Scroll safe for me- it's very possible the Moth Priest heard of it and came to investigate."

Serana arched an eyebrow. Unlike the Dragonborn, her bangs did not obscure her eyebrows* so the expression was visible. "You have an Elder Scroll?"

*_This is because her tomb was visited regularly__(kind of)__ by hairdressers __(and those people who do nails, both finger and toe)__, who came to Dimhallow Crypt with the belief that the slumbering vampire maiden was, in fact, an extremely lifelike mannequin that was enchanted to have hair and nails that would grow at the same speed as those of a living human being. She was used as a final examination for students of the famed 'Cosmetology College of Morthal' for centuries- until, upon realizing that cosmetology was NOT some sort of powerful magic, the Nords of Morthal razed the campus and beat the students and teachers so badly that they became ugly vikings -much like the rest of the populous of Skyrim. This tragedy occurred a mere three months before the Dragonborn escaped from Helgen._

The Dovahkiin nodded. "It's at the College, but, yes, I do. I had to get it to learn Dragonrend, a shout that makes dragons fall from the sky..." The Dragonborn paused. "Well, I _THOUGHT_ I had learn Dragonrend, because I thought that I actually _NEEDED_ it to kill Alduin. Can you imagine my face when, instead of crippling, weakening, or otherwise impairing the dragon, it forces the damn thing to land? Usually nearby? I mean, what the hell was Paarthurnax thinking, anyways? Could he not tell that I was a mage? Was the lack of, oh, I dunno, FUCKING _ARMOR_ not enough for him to tell that I was not a warrior who would not be able to kill a dragon in flight?"

Lydia snickered. "I'm not even gonna lie, that was _hilarious_."

The Dragonborn slowed his breathing and calmed down significantly. "Personally, I thought it was funnier when Odahviing landed on you."

Lydia's eyes narrowed. "I thought we agreed to never speak of that again."

"Alduin nearly tore my arm off!"

"You cried and nearly incinerated Odahviing when you thought he'd killed me."

"AT LEAST I DIDN'T LAUGH AT YOU!"

"You laughed when he farted on me."

"But.. that was hilarious, and I was happy you were alive."

"Do you have any idea how terrible dragon ass smells?"

Serana cleared her throat. "Not that this isn't a _fascinating_ conversation, but we need to get going, before the Moth Priest's trail goes cold."

Lydia and the Dovahkiin blew raspberries at one another, then hardened their expressions into much more serious ones. Lydia put two fingers in her mouth and whistled for her steed, who was known to some as 'Tim the Slayer' and to the dovah- the dragons- as '_Qanhaarin_', which means 'Vanquisher' in their tongue.

The Dragonborn, unable to whistle, snapped his fingers. "Shadowmere~! Come here, you dark and mysterious beast of murder~!"

Shadowmere appeared from nowhere, standing majestically before the Dovahkiin. Tim, being a mere horse with no magical and/or interdimensional powers, leapt down from atop his perch on the nearest mountainside like the rest of us mortals, leaving an impact crater large enough for a nice fire pit** and sending up a rather large cloud of dust and debris.

**_That's exactly what the Dawnguard later used it as. Tim's 'horse-hole' became the most renowned barbeque pit in all of Skyrim, rivaling even the famed Red Mountain of Morrowind. This is impressive because the Red Mountain is the biggest volcano in Tamriel- and therefore the largest barbeque pit._

"This had better be important," Shadowmere stated, her menacing red eyes regarding her 'master' in a very critical way.

"It is," the Dovahkiin said in as reassuring a way as he possibly could, "We need to find a Moth Priest to keep the world safe from vampires."

Shadowmere tossed her head. "Very well," she sighed, "let us be swift- I have important business of my own to attend to."

The Dragonborn bowed respectfully to the horse. "I understand. Thank you for coming so quickly, friend."

"You only call on me in times of need, Listener," the mare replied, "and you are always respectful and polite... though the bowing is strange. Truly, you should return to the tiny little head movements."

The Dragonborn nodded his little nod. "This is Serana," he said, gesturing to the vampiress, "would you allow her to ride you?"

Shadowmere snorted. "A vampiress... very well. Like you, she is rather... dainty." The shadowy horse seemed amused by this. "I must admit, I thought you preferred living females..."

The Dragonborn blushed in the shadow of his scaly cowl. "And now even the horse is giving me lip," he sighed.

"Oh, please," the horse replied, "don't pretend you don't fancy her. She obviously shares the feeling, waltzing into Fort Dawnguard to find you." Shadowmere tossed her mane. "I'm assuming, of course, that Fort Dawnguard is still the home of the vampire-hunting Dawnguard."

Serana turned away from them and flipped up her cowl, casting her face in shadow as well. "Y-your horse is r-ridiculous."

"Yes, I suppose I am..." The horse looked sadly up at the moon. "I'll be back soon, Princess," she whispered.

The Dovahkiin frowned. "Shadowmere, you're acting weird. What's going on?"

Shadowmere cleared her throat. "That... is a story for another time."

Tim reared up on his hind legs and kicked at the air. "[Dammit, Shadowmere,]" he whinnied in the language of horses, "[you're leaving us on a cliffhanger!]"

"Oh, great," Lydia said, "now my horse is being ridiculous, too. Only, I mean that he's legitimately being ridiculous, because I'm not a tsundere vampire woman."

Serana climbed up onto Shadowmere and seated herself behind the Dovahkiin. "We'll never speak of this."

"...Agreed."


End file.
